View full size(AP Photo/Daniel Beltra - Greenpeace)This image provided by Greenpeace shows an aerial view of a shrimp boat hauling oil cleanup booms near the oil spill slowly approaching the coast of Louisiana east of the mouth of the Mississippi river on Tuesday May 4, 2010. Coast Guard officials knew for years there could be signifiant problems in the federal and industry response to a major oil spill.U.S. Coast Guard officials have apparently known for years that there could be significant problems in the federal and industry response to a major oil spill.

The report that followed a 2004 "Spill of National Significance" training exercise concluded, "Oil spill response personnel did not appear to have even a basic knowledge of the equipment required to support salvage or spill clean up operations."

Warnings ignored

Mobile-area scientists warned BP PLC officials and Coast Guard Adm. Thad
Allen a week ago that the use of dispersants both on the surface and
underwater at the
Deepwater Horizon well could have grave consequences for the Gulf
ecosystem.

The scientists, Bob Shipp of the University of South
Alabama and George Crozier of the Dauphin Island Sea Lab, said they felt
their concerns were ignored at the time.

It continued, "as a result, some issues and complex processes unique to spill response were not effectively addressed."

The so-called SONS exercises have been conducted by the Coast Guard and other agencies every two or three years since 1997. They involve a variety of scenarios, such as tanker accidents or pipeline accidents, and all end with large-scale releases of oil. Each time, the Coast Guard produces what it calls an After Action Report.

The Press-Register obtained a portion of the 2004 report that was online. Officials at Coast Guard headquarters in Washington, D.C., on Thursday would not provide the full reports for 2004, 2007, or the exercise conducted in March.

The agency did not respond when asked if the later reports detailed progress made in response preparation since the 2004 exercise.

"There was a shortage of personnel with experience to fill key positions," the 2004 report read. "Many middle-level spill management staff had never worked a large spill and some had never been involved in an exercise."

A "Lessons Learned" report from the 2002 exercise stated that primary spill response items, such as dispersants, were "not generally available." It specifically mentioned the equipment required to burn oil on the surface -- called a fire boom -- and stated that the law established "a limited requirement for dispersant capability and no requirements for other new technology capabilities."

The Press-Register has previously reported that, in the days after the Deepwater Horizon spill began, federal officials had to purchase a fire boom from a company in Illinois in order to conduct a test burn. Though a 1994 federal plan grants pre-approval to burn oil in the event of a major spill in the Gulf, there is no law requiring oil companies or the government to have fire boom available, as the Coast Guard document pointed out in 2002.